House hunting: waiting for the feeling versus settling out of fear

Frederick describes having instantly known his current home was the one, and now, after viewing many houses, never getting that feeling; he wonders whether requiring the feeling is a limitation.

The Wonders say it is a limitation, but that he is looking for something to last the rest of his life rather than a temporary home, and is waiting for the universe to line everything up.

More importantly, he has been looking in the wrong direction — at places he would have to settle for rather than what he wants — driven by fear that prices are not coming down and he had better find something.

That is why nothing gives him the sense that this is the one.

Their advice is to shift his expectations: just because the world is afraid does not mean he must be, and a contracting world is the perfect moment for him not to contract.

If he sees himself as always self-sufficient, he can choose freely whatever the circumstances — when everyone is crying that the sky is falling, that is the moment to sell umbrellas.

But if he is afraid of getting the house he wants, he is only selling umbrellas cautiously, no different from the others, merely shouting less loudly.